Industry Eye: Case Study - Green Valley Pecan Co. Is Nuts About Its Revamped Marketing Database

Problem: Green Valley Pecan Co., a multichannel retailer of pecans and other assorted nuts, sought a more sophisticated marketing database to help acquire, retain and grow its customer base.

Solution: Hired a marketing agency to refine its strategies.

Results: Increased sales and profits in each of the past five years. Web traffic, page views and time spent per page are up 50 percent, 102 percent and 35 percent, respectively, this year vs. 2008. Internet orders now account for close to 50 percent of all sales. The company is enjoying savings of nearly $10,000 annually from printing and postage costs thanks to a cleaner customer database.

Pecan trees weren’t the only things that needed to grow for Green Valley Pecan to remain in business. A customer database that had atrophied over the years left the 61-year-old family-run business stagnant and looking for answers. Poor data hygiene, lackluster creative, uninspiring merchandise presentation, and unsophisticated data analysis and e-commerce capabilities all were holding the company back.

So five years ago, the Sahuarita, Ariz.-based Green Valley Pecan Co. reached out to AIR Marketing for help. Initially consulting on creative printing and direct mail services related to Green Valley Pecan’s mail order catalog, AIR has since worked closely with Green Valley on everything from customer database segmentation to email to social networking.

In that time, Green Valley’s sales and profits have increased each year, with total revenues this year surpassing $1 million. The merchant operates one store, a catalog and an e-commerce website.

A database that was a mere listing of customers who’d purchased from Green Valley Pecan one way or another impeded the company’s ability to effectively resell to past patrons. And without regular merge/purge processes and National Change of Address updates, many of the names on that list were useless. AIR has helped clean that up.